Revelations
by filthiestofweebsdesu
Summary: Deathstroke is hired to assassinate one of Bruce Wayne's kids. He's thrown for a loop, though, when he realizes just who it is he's about to kill.


Slade would say he never saw a point to these types of galas, but having attended several of them himself, he knew that wasn't _entirely_ true: they were a _fantastic_ way of observing very important people without looking suspicious, or at least not any more suspicious than the rest of the diamond-encrusted slime that frequented the things.

But he wouldn't be attending the party tonight, just observing it through a sniper lens from a distant rooftop, because his target was _too_ important for Slade not to inevitably wind up arousing suspicion if he was seen with him on the night of his death.

The target: Richard Grayson, ward of Bruce Wayne, one of the most wealthy people in the country and probably _the_ most wealthy non-criminal in all of Gotham. (At least, non-criminal as far as anybody knew.)

Why Grayson and not Wayne himself? He didn't know, and didn't concern himself with it; he didn't like to get any more involved with the personal lives of his victims nor his employers' reasons for wanting them dead than he had to, since that was a slippery slope to...

...no, now definitely wasn't the time to think like that. He could think about it later, after he got paid.

So, for now, he didn't think at all. He merely watched, waiting silently from the shadows above like a cat ready to pounce.

He ended up waiting a while; Grayson was evidently almost as popular as the man of the night himself, and even though he didn't look to be quite as comfortable with the scene as Bruce did, he was still wandering about the ballroom and chatting with the guests for at least a good two hours before he finally settled down, seating himself at a small table and striking up a conversation with a redheaded, wheelchaired young woman across from him. The two seemed like they had a history, and both quickly became visibly more comfortable as they spoke to each other in a way Slade could only assume was fondly (though he didn't bother trying to read their lips; this wasn't a spying mission, their conversation was their business, and he would respect that). It was looking like they were going to be there for quite some time, and the crowd around them was still big enough that if he acted relatively soon, Slade would be long gone before anyone could spot him through the soon-to-be confused jumble of panicked partygoers.

So, after waiting a few minutes just to be sure Grayson wasn't going to get back up again, Slade carefully adjusted his aim, lining up the barrel so the bullet would enter his skull straight through the center.

Ever-so slowly, with not so much as a blink, Slade grazed his finger against the trigger, and...

...and...

...and something didn't feel right.

In fact, the feeling of something _off_ had been distantly nagging at the back of his brain all night, but until now, he had simply chalked it up to the realization that this assignment would have such major, global repercussions. But that couldn't be right, because that had never stopped him before. No, no, it was something else.

It was the fact that the way his target moved was too familiar. Sure, there was a certain kind of stiffness, of _properness_, to his posture that was very much to be expected of a Wayne, but an eye as keen as Slade's could tell that that was all faked; Slade was now fixated on something he recognized beneath it. Beneath it, he almost moved like...

...he almost moved like Robin.

Well, not the current Robin. The original Robin, the Robin roaming the Blüdhaven streets as Nightwing now, wearing himself thin picking up the slack for a no-good, very-corrupt police force. The Robin Slade had had more run-ins with than the Big Bat or any of his other little soldiers combined. The Robin that, somehow, was always finding new, show-offish ways to test Slade's very lenient patience. The Robin that, when Deathstroke was in Bat territory, just wouldn't leave him _alone_, for _one night_, to do his job in fucking _peace_.

The Robin that Slade, strangely, hadn't seen all weekend.

...but, no, that idea was laughable. Gotham and its suburbs were huge, harboring a gigantic population. The odds of Richard Grayson and Nightwing being the same person were literally one in several million. Not to mention the fact that Nightwing was obviously currently stationed in Blüdhaven, and the Waynes, quite famously, resided in Gotham.

...Ah, but that's right, Grayson had moved to Blüdhaven at some point, hadn't he? Slade had seen something about it on the news a while back; the guy worked as a police officer there now, or something. Odd choice of work for a billionaire's foster son, but..._but_, it wouldn't be nearly so odd if he had ulterior, vigilante-related motives.

Come to think of it, Richard shared Robin's coloring, too. And his height, his build, his hair, his jaw, his nose, they were all eerily similar to the masked vigilante's. Since Nightwing was usually only seen in the dark, most likely wouldn't ever make the connection. But Slade had enhanced eyesight and had spent much more time near the hero than your average criminal.

Still though, it was unlikely. Slade figured even that probably narrowed the odds to one in a few thousand or so. Not to mention the fact that things like masks, necklines, clothing color, lighting, makeup...they could all very easily change the impression of a face; it was distinctly possible that if Nightwing was dressed as his civilian self, the two wouldn't look very much alike at all.

...though, if he were merely to _entertain_ the thought, _hypothetically_...the Bats would need money for their operations, and lots of it. They clearly had access to very advanced technology and medical care, and an extraordinarily vast library of information. Whoever Nightwing was, he would need access to an absolute _fortune_, or somebody _with_ one.

That rose the odds to...well, it rose them a _lot_.

But still, it was absurd. How could he even entertain the idea? The Bats were all highly-trained super soldiers, practically _ninjas_ (and hell, Slade wouldn't be surprised if they had actually been mentored by some at some point). But the Waynes? Well, let's just say they weren't the most capable lot. Bruce's parents, before their deaths, had been the real talent of the family as far as brains went, and certainly hadn't been athletic.

...but at the same time, though...Slade knew Bruce wasn't the brightest nor the most graceful, but the public knew next to nothing about his foster children. The only thing the public really knew about any of them was that the first one (_the one he_ _currently had a sniper rifle pointed at_, Slade's mind helpfully added) had been a circus acrobat, one of the three Flying Graysons, before his parents were murdered by some criminal with a grudge.

...oh.

He had been an acrobat. An _expert_ one.

His parents had been murdered by a known criminal that had slipped through the cracks of the law, and just a few short years after Wayne had taken the boy in, Batman gained a child sidekick.

And maybe...maybe Slade hadn't given Wayne enough credit, either. After all, if you were Batman _and_ a celebrity, you'd probably want to avoid arousing any suspicion of a connection between the two personas however possible, and that would mean, as a civilian, behaving in a manner completely the opposite of what people would expect from Batman: foolish, clumsy, and drawn to the clamor of the spotlight just as Batman is drawn to the quiet of the shadows.

Because hypothetically, if the kid _was_ the first Robin, then by extension, that would probably mean...

...it _was_ absurd, absolutely, but it made so much _sense_.

And it was certainly a dilemma.

It was true that Deathstroke had been offered very good money to take out Richard John Grayson. Very, _very_ good money indeed. But...

But if he shot the kid, and he _was_ Nightwing, Blüdhaven would soon be crawling with crime (even more so than usual), which would, truthfully, start to get pretty damn annoying pretty damn fast. Worse, Batman would _know_ who did it—he always seemed to figure those things out, even with a wiped trail, somehow—and he wouldn't leave Slade alone until he was either behind (super-proofed) bars or dead, depending on how unhinged he would become over his first son being gunned down just as his late parents had been. (Because as collected as Batman had lead so many to believe he was, Slade knew that even steel could snap if you knew where to hit it.)

Slade knew he was probably just being paranoid (because honestly, this entire thing was _ridiculous_), but he also knew that paranoia had served him quite splendidly over the years. He just couldn't justify gambling with something like this, not when hitting the jackpot meant being hunted by a potentially unhinged, bloodthirsty bat. Because as confident as he was in his ability to fight or shake off pursuers, he also wasn't stupid enough to underestimate the most feared and revered entity in all of Gotham, especially if said entity—usually _so_ predictable—would be in such an _un_predictable state.

Yes, that was definitely why Slade decided to walk away.

That was definitely why he called the job off with his employer, spewing some BS about how killing a Wayne could wreak havoc on Gotham's economy, and how he'd still like to make a living here, thank you very much.

And that was _definitely_ why he tracked down and snuck into his ex-employer's home later that night, putting a bullet between the man's eyes as he slept, never to be the wiser.


End file.
